‘Secret Diplomacy’ Ruled Out by Bush : Gulf crisis: President says Baker’s message in Geneva will be for Iraq to get out of Kuwait or face the consequences. Aziz declines EC’s offer to meet.

President Bush insisted Saturday that Secretary of State James A. Baker III will not engage in “secret diplomacy” when he meets with Iraq’s foreign minister this week but instead will deliver a stern warning that war is imminent if Iraq remains in Kuwait after Jan. 15.

“Withdraw from Kuwait unconditionally and immediately or face the terrible consequences” is the message Baker will give to Iraqi Foreign Minister Tarik Aziz during their discussions in Geneva on Wednesday, Bush said in a nationwide radio address.

Meanwhile, Aziz announced in Baghdad that he had declined an offer to engage in talks in Luxembourg this week with European Community foreign ministers, contending that the ministers were allowing their approach to be dictated from Washington.

Aziz had been invited to meet with EC officials on Thursday, the day after his scheduled meeting with Baker.

The President clarified the purpose of Baker’s mission in the 6 1/2-minute radio address. Bush also met privately for three hours Saturday at his Camp David, Md., retreat with U.N. Secretary General Javier Perez de Cuellar, who has been working quietly in an effort to try to resolve the Persian Gulf crisis.

No new peace initiatives were announced after the meeting between Bush and Perez de Cuellar, and the U.N. official told reporters that he had no immediate plans to travel to Baghdad for renewed talks to avert war.

Bush’s statement that the Baker-Aziz meeting “will not be secret diplomacy at work” came as a serious disappointment to members of Congress who have been hoping that a diplomatic mission could produce a compromise that would avert war with Iraq.

Sen. David Boren (D-Okla.), chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said he strongly disagreed with Bush’s decision that Baker cannot go on to Baghdad to meet with Iraqi President Saddam Hussein if the meeting with Aziz produces any progress toward a settlement.

“I think we should walk the extra mile to make sure that we give diplomacy a chance,” Boren said.

Bush’s radio address, in which he outlined several reasons why the United States should go to war if Iraq refuses to withdraw from Kuwait by Jan. 15, was clearly designed to bolster public support for the war effort and to undermine members of Congress who oppose the use of military force.

If the Democratic-controlled Congress were to vote now on the question of whether to go to war, it appears the Senate would reject military action while the House would approve it by a narrow margin. For that reason, Bush has not asked Congress for authorization and has insisted that he has the right to go to war without congressional approval.

Speaking directly to his opponents on Capitol Hill, Bush said that all U.S. citizens owe it to the nearly 400,000 American military personnel currently deployed in the Persian Gulf region not to flinch in the face of war.

“That is why we must all stand together, not as Republicans or Democrats, conservatives or liberals, but as Americans,” he said.

Explaining his rationale for using military force, Bush said Iraq poses a strategic threat to other countries in the Middle East and an economic threat to the emerging democracies of Eastern Europe and Latin America as well as the United States itself.

“At this critical moment in history, at a time the Cold War is fading into the past, we cannot fail,” the President said. “At stake is not simply some distant country called Kuwait. At stake is the kind of world we will inhabit.”

Bush said he is not promising to attack Iraq immediately after Jan. 15, the deadline set by the U.N. Security Council, but he stressed that “time is running out” for a peaceful solution because “each day that passes brings real costs.”

Those costs include allowing Iraq to continue to develop biological and nuclear weapons that threaten the security of the Middle East, he said. Likewise, he added, Iraq can continue to tighten its grip on world oil supplies and prolong the suffering of people in Kuwait.

According to White House officials, Bush has ruled out give-and-take negotiations between Baker and Aziz because he fears the Iraqis will seek to drag out the discussions beyond Jan. 15 and to force the United States to address other matters, including Israeli occupation of the West Bank of the Jordan River and the Gaza Strip as well as Syria’s military intervention in Lebanon.

Iraqi Ambassador Mohammed Mashat said on CNN’s “Newsmaker Saturday” program that Aziz wants to address “all issues” with Baker. While Bush described the Geneva meeting as an extra step to prevent war, Mashat characterized it as only “the first step.”

In a statement issued in Baghdad, the Iraqi Foreign Ministry said Aziz was rejecting the European Community’s invitation to go to Luxembourg for talks because it appeared that the EC’s actions were being dictated by Washington.

Luxembourg’s Foreign Minister Jacques Poos had said Friday that the community would stand by Washington’s rejection of any linkage between a solution to the gulf crisis and the Arab-Israeli conflict.

An Iraqi Foreign Ministry spokesman said Aziz had told Poos that “we resent the submissive policies pursued by certain European governments toward the aggressive and haughty American policies.”

He added: “These governments should realize that he who wants to talk to Iraq should visit Baghdad and talk directly to officials there.”

After his meeting with Bush, Perez de Cuellar told reporters that it would be inappropriate for him to go to Baghdad to resume talks with Iraqi officials until after the Baker-Aziz meeting. Neither he nor White House officials would discuss details of his meeting with Bush.

“The President and the secretary general expressed their determination to achieve fully the objectives outlined in the United Nations Security Council resolutions,” a White House statement said.

The statement said Bush had thanked Perez de Cuellar for his efforts in guiding the United Nations “during this historic period which has witnessed unprecedented international unity in the face of blatant Iraqi aggression.”

Bush’s unwillingness to engage in open-ended talks with the Iraqis has clearly added to his difficulties with Democrats in Congress. Congressional leaders have been unwilling to endorse the use of force against Iraq, and they are insisting that the President has no constitutional powers to go to war without the approval of Congress.

Sen. John Chafee (R-R.I.) said on CNN’s “Newsmaker Saturday” that he does not expect to see Congress “stepping up to the mark and supporting the President on this.” And Rep. Dante Fascell (D-Fla.), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, added that Congress is only reflecting the feelings of many Americans.

Although polls show strong support for Bush, Fascell said, “There is not the fervor to go to war that there was with the bombing of Pearl Harbor.”

While members of Congress have also been divided on the timing of a war resolution vote, Boren hinted at a possible compromise. He said it is possible that Congress will soon enact a measure establishing “expedited procedures” for a quick vote on a resolution of war after Jan. 15, if there is no settlement.

Such procedures might satisfy the President’s concern that a divisive war powers debate in Congress before the Jan. 15 deadline would undermine efforts to persuade Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait or could delay military action for weeks after the deadline passes.

Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), who was interviewed along with Boren on CNN’s “Evans and Novak” program, said such a proposal would be “an improvement over the current situation.”

If the President truly wants to avoid “another Vietnam,” as he has said, he should not embark on a war without the support of Congress and the public, said Boren. “We should have learned that from Vietnam.”

Both Chafee and Fascell said they expect the United States to go to war against Iraq. But Boren called it only a “50-50 proposition,” and Lugar predicted the Iraqis would begin a withdrawal from Kuwait or some other action to forestall war.